by A. L. Tyler
Lena chimed in as she approached. “Hey.”
The young man, who had up to this point been staring at a spot on the wall across the way, straightened up and set his coffee down on the floor as he turned to look at her. “Hello, can I help you?”
Lena nodded toward the door. “How is he?”
The young man looked at her hesitantly. “Well…well I’m not sure if…”
Lena looked at the ground. She didn’t like what she was about to do, but she didn’t want to leave without knowing if Devin was going to be okay. She looked the man in the eye. “I pay your boss. Literally, out of my pocket and into his, the way it’s been for several generations. So tell me what’s going on in there, or—“
“No. That’s not what I mean.” He stood up to face her properly. “There’s a lot of damage, and everything that can be done is being done. He’s in a lot of pain, which we’re alleviating as much as possible, but you have to understand that he’s lost a kidney and parts of his liver. He’s going to lose several sections out of his small intestine, which is where most of the complications came in. All of the organs that were hit either contained toxins that they filtered from the blood, or digestive enzymes, which are now spreading throughout his body as we try to clean them out.”
He paused. Lena swallowed and tried not to look too worried, even though she felt it. She felt terrible; all of this was her fault. The young assistant continued.
“Now, he’s lucky as far as human-borns go, because he appears to be resistant to infection, but you need to understand that what’s happening to him now is just as dangerous, if not more so, because his body is being attack by its own toxins and digestive processes.”
He watched Lena. She tried to remain calm. “So, what are you trying to say? What are his chances?”
“They’re not good.” He sighed, looked at Lena, and then away. “And frankly, miss, the only reason we’re trying is because you’re demanding it. His life isn’t going to be pleasant, even after we get him sewn back together. Did it ever occur to you that maybe it was just his time?”
Lena stared at the young man until he looked back up at her; there was a sort of arrogance about his stony brown eyes that she had only ever attributed to doctors. They all had God complexes, deciding who lived and who died, and this one seemed more than a little put out that the decision to end it, for once, was not in his hands. Lena spoke with determination. “No. It didn’t. Because it’s not his time. And I want to be informed the second he’s allowed visitors.”
The man nodded and she turned and left. Lena went back to her room, and Mrs. Ralston brought her breakfast and sat with her. She mentioned that she hadn’t seen Griffin at any meals since breakfast the day before, and that some of the other Representatives were becoming anxious about the situation; given the precarious standing of the Daray household, many of them were worried that he was sick—some of them, no doubt, were anxiously hopeful that it would be lethal. She asked Lena if she knew anything about it. Lena lied and said she didn’t, and told Mrs. Ralston that she would find him and talk to him, which she promptly did after her trays were taken away.
She walked up to the fourth floor and knocked on his door. He didn’t answer.
Griffin!
She knocked again, harder.
Griffin, come on, you can’t stay in there forever!
Lena stood in front of the door for several more moments, but he never came. She knocked a third time, but still nothing. She tried the door handle, but it was locked, so she sat down next to the wall.
Look, please open the door, okay? I don’t know what happened way back when, and it makes no sense that you’re doing this. I mean, so what? So what, Griffin? So he lied to you about some stuff. My dad lied to me about stuff, but he had his reasons. I mean, I’m not saying that my grandfather had reasons, because he was just a bastard sometimes, but I found some stuff that I want you to look at. I think we should look into this, because I’m beginning to think that something was going on. And maybe it was all a lie, and maybe it was all true, but there’s only one way we’re going to find out, and that’s to go looking for the answers.
Lena paused. She couldn’t hear any activity behind the door. She sighed, and tried a different tactic.
People are starting to worry about you, Griffin. And we don’t need them worrying now, when we’re dealing with this whole situation with Rollin. I mean, do your drama on your own time, okay? We don’t need people worrying about the Daray house in addition to the challenge to the authority of the Council. You’re being such a selfish brat.
Nothing.
Oh, by the way, I brought Devin into Waldgrave and he’s staying because I say so.
Nothing. Lena’s brow crinkled; something wasn’t right.
Griffin? Are you even there?
Lena pressed her ear to the door, but there wasn’t anything to hear. In his normal state, he never would have allowed her to speak to him in that fashion—anything that resembled a flat order or demand was usually enough to set him off. Calling him a brat should have created some sort of angry response, and she didn’t care how sulky he was, news that Devin had come into Waldgrave should have instigated a small war…spending so much time and effort to save the life of a human-born was ridiculous. Besides, Griffin hated Devin. He hated the very thought of him, because he felt outdone by him; Devin was the one thing that never failed to goad him to a response. He must have been really depressed to not even bother to answer…
Panic suddenly flooded through her veins. Griffin?! Open the door now!
She stood up and pounded on the door. She twisted the door handle back and forth, and then tried to shoulder the door in, but quickly realized that she was far too short and light to have any effect on it. She braced herself in the small inlet of the door frame and braced her foot on the door handle. She kicked it hard several times, until it loosened and finally fell free. With the lock broken, she forced the door open.
Griffin!
She looked wildly around the room—he wasn’t there. She checked the bathroom and the closet, but they were both empty. It was only then that she settled down enough to actually take stock of the room itself. There were suitcases on the bed; Lena turned back to the closet and the realization that that it wasn’t just empty of Griffin. There was nothing; no clothes on the hangers, no shoes next to the wall, nothing folded on the shelves.
And there were blue, higher-end model, wheeled suitcases perched ever so carefully on top of the gold velvet comforter, largest to smallest, left to right. A voice spoke from behind her.
“What are you doing? And what the hell did you do to the door?”
Lena spun around; Griffin was standing in the doorway, looking bewildered and slightly vexed as he explored the empty hole that his door handle had once filled. She rushed over toward him and hugged him, but he pushed her away.
“Don’t touch me now.” He pushed passed her and went over to the suitcases, and moved them with his good arm, one by one, to the floor.
Lena crossed her arms and tried not to feel too rejected. He was, at least, acting like himself; in a bad mood, perhaps, but she had dealt with this behavior before. “I’m sorry…I was, well, Mrs. Ralston said that…the door was locked and I worried, and…”
“You were worried about what? That I’d end up like my father? But then, he wasn’t a real suicide. You know all about that.” Griffin paused and gave a wry smile. “And why did you kick the door in?”
“Because it was locked and you weren’t answering.” Lena said flatly.
“I always lock my door when I’m away. I’m surprised you don’t know that by now.” Griffin used his good arm to stack one of the smaller suitcases on top of a bigger one and then started wheeling them towards the door.
As he neared, Lena used her body to block the frame. “What are you doing?”
Griffin readjusted the weight of the smaller suitcase, which was starting to slip, and gave Lena an annoyed look. “I’m leaving. I believe w
e discussed this back in Texas, remember? You don’t want me here, and now I don’t to be here. It’s lucky the market is so bad now—I never actually sold the house in California.”
He tried to push past her again, but she stood her ground. “But—no. I mean, you can’t just leave like this. I mean, how are you going to manage things from California, Griffin, for God’s sake—what about Rollin? What about Devin? What about—Jesus, Griffin, you’re not even gone yet and things are all going to hell so fast that I feel like my head is spinning! This is your responsibility! You can’t just walk out on all of this!”
She thought she saw a twitch of a smile on his face in response to her fanaticism as he put the suitcases down and pulled her back into the room so that he could close the door. He leaned against the door momentarily, just looking at her, before he started talking again.
“None of it is my responsibility, Lena, because he was a fraud. None of this…” He gestured around the room, “Is mine. This is the responsibility of the Daray family, which you have so ably exposed as a lie. This—all of this—is over a religion that is dead. Because—“
“But it’s not! I mean, it could—“
“Just let me finish!” He barked, glaring at her. “The religion is dead, and who knows for how long. Nothing of what I know makes sense with what we saw yesterday. None of it. I’ve wasted my life on lies, and I don’t intend to do it anymore. I’m going to California, and as you’ve told me so many times, the Council will be much better off without the Darays.”
Lena stared at him; there was so much determination in his eyes, but his words just felt so hollow. “No! No, you can’t just leave us here! There’s going to be questions, and—“
“Maybe there should be questions. Maybe it’s time this whole thing was exposed. But I don’t care; do what you want with it, Lena. It’s all yours now, because I’m not going to be a part of this cover-up anymore.” He picked up the suitcases and went out into the hall.
“I…people need you, Griffin. I need you. I can’t do this alone—they won’t follow me!” She pleaded as she watched his retreating form.
He took a few more steps and then stopped. He didn’t turn around. “I told you, I’m done with the lies.”
“They’re happy with the lies, Griffin! They can’t handle this, and you know it—maybe before, but not now. It will rip us apart. Not with Rollin out there, hanging over us like some…some damn self-ordained angel of death. They can’t handle this now, so please, please stay. Stay until we can tell them, and we’ll work through this one problem at a time.”
Griffin was silent for a moment. She walked forward and put a hand on his shoulder, but he shook her off. “I’m leaving, Lena. I can’t stay here. It’s in your hands now, and you can do what you think is best. If you want to handle it by creating more lies, then do it alone.” He let go of the suitcase and reached toward the wall to steady himself like he was dizzy.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” His voice cracked. Lena stared momentarily at the sling and all of the reparative casing around his left arm; he still had a long way to go before it would ever be normal again. He started to speak as he reached toward the suitcase handle. “I left you a note under your door, concerning some loose ends, and I’d appreciate if you take care of it for me. I think I’m going to miss you, Lena, but I’m not sure. I want to be alone now, and I don’t want you disappointing yourself by thinking that I’m ever coming back. Things aren’t the way they were before.”
He walked away down the hall, turned the corner, and then he was gone. She went back into his room and sat on the bed next to the other two suitcases on the floor. Griffin was briefly back up to get them, and then he was leaving for good. She followed him down to the drive, somehow hoping that he was joking or that he would change his mind at the last second, but he didn’t. The cat jumped in the car after him, and when he tried to push it back out Lena begged him to take it; she didn’t want it, and in her heart she knew the cat knew his owner. So he took it out of apathy. As she watched the car pull away, she didn’t know what was going to happen, or how she was going to handle the storm approaching on the horizon. Griffin was really gone this time.
She had never felt so lonely or unprepared in her life.
*****
The note under her door turned out to be little more than half a page, asking her to mind his political situation and to quickly retrieve his one-year-old brother from the Channing residence if he fell out of favor. He asked her to look after Darius in such a case, as Griffin had no interest in caring for him at the time being, but promised to send money if it was needed. She tucked the note carefully into her pocket to show Howard later; it was probable that Griffin would fall out of good favor since he was acting so strangely, and there was planning to do if there was going to be a baby at Waldgrave.
That day at lunch she made an informal announcement that in light of the failed recovery of the portal, Griffin had decided to go back to California to look over some of Master Daray’s private notes more carefully. With so many skeptical faces watching her, she decided it might be best to expand a little to keep the gossip at bay.
“The object recovered by Ben Collins was not the genuine article, which means that the real portal, if it was ever real to begin with, hasn’t been seen by a Silenti in more than fifty years, and even then the object purported to be the portal may have been a fake. We have no leads. It’s gone, and that’s a fact that we’re all going to have to deal with sooner or later.”
She sat back down amidst what she suspected were silent whispers. The meal passed without much audible talk, though Howard gave her an impressed look. They hadn’t spoken much over the past weeks; aside from Griffin, Lena hadn’t spoken much to anyone since returning to Waldgrave, excepting Mrs. Ralston, who told her that her silence had by and large been viewed as appropriate given the circumstances. Despite the fact that she wasn’t talking so much to Howard, he seemed to understand; they were the last two remnants of a long and painful legacy of deceit, lies, and betrayal. There just weren’t any words; it was too much to talk about. They both went on understanding this fact, and each other, and it was enough.
After lunch, Lena checked in on Devin’s condition again with the intern in the hall before going out to sit in the greenhouse to think; she needed to figure out what her next move was going to be, because she expected that with the portal gone from the Council’s mind, she was about to be a key component of decisions regarding what to do about Rollin. And then there was Griffin; she still wasn’t sure how his decision to leave was going to go over, but she was betting that it wouldn’t go over well. The Silenti, and especially the Old Faith families, were about dominance; with the Darays gone, the leadership position had to be filled. Historically speaking, a spree of murders, blackmail, and upheaval was associated with the process of selecting the next leader as people tried to claw their way to the top.
The greenhouse was a serene place for thinking, but it was also a public one—when she went out, Jason Rivera was already there. Lena froze in her steps as their eyes met; she had been keeping so much to herself that she hadn’t even known that Jason had been around for the past few weeks, but if she had known, she probably would have taken the time to speak with him about the death of his father, Matias.
He resembled him so much despite the fact that he was so young; even down to the depth of his dark eyes. Only in his late teens, and already a full member of the Council. Her voice caught in her throat. He used to wear shirts with political slogans or band logos on them, but now he wore button down shirts. The third culture kid, as Hesper had called him; he had spent his life living with humans, and now he was in the center of a different world, with no one to guide him. Lena had never known him well, but had always liked him; she doubted he would ever like her back, and she couldn’t blame him.
His expression was completely neutral as he looked at her. He gestured to a seat near his own. “I guess a lot has changed since the l
ast time I saw you.”
“I’m sorry about your father.” She blurted out.
He gestured her to sit again, nodding. “Thank you.”
Lena walked over to the wrought iron garden chair and sat, caught so off guard that she forgot to close the first story greenhouse door behind her. “On a personal level, I mean. I’m very sorry about your father, because it was my proposal in the first place, and because we developed an allegiance before his death. He was a good man. He believed in what we were doing.”
Jason nodded, still avoiding eye contact. “He told me. We emailed while he was gone, because he was very skeptical at first. He thought that you were a fake, and a waste of time, but then when it started to work…He often spoke of how forthright you were about finding it and giving it to the Council. He spoke of you in terms of a good political ally in years to come. He believed that you were the future of the fight against the Darays, and here you are—you’re here at Waldgrave, and the Daray heir isn’t. Maybe he was right.”
Lena frowned; she was speechless. Jason turned his head to look at her.
“I…well, I mean, that was Griffin’s decision to leave. I didn’t tell him to go.” Lena shrugged.
Jason’s expression didn’t change. “My father believed very strongly that you would find it. The portal. Did you find it?”
Lena sat back. Was he interrogating her? “I…no. Yes. Yes, I found the thing that we were tracking, but no, it wasn’t the portal. You haven’t read the record I gave? It’s all in there.”
She stared at Jason, as he stared back. He had been such a happy teen before; they had eaten dinner together occasionally. He was always smiling, laughing, talking to everyone—but now he was so serious. He raised his eyebrows. “Well, I only ask because some of us think you’re bluffing. It’s very convenient that you say you didn’t find it, and yet young Master Corbett is off again, doing what he does best—retrieving things to deliver back to the last of the Daray line.”